More than 3,000 lots flooded by Hurricane Katrina and bought with federal money in an emergency bailout sit idle across this city a multimillion-dollar drain on federal, state and city coffers that lends itself to no easy solution. An Associated Press examination of the properties sold to the government by homeowners abandoning New Orleans after the catastrophic 2005 flood has found that about $86 million has been spent on 5,100 abandoned parcels. And theres no end in sight to maintenance costs for perhaps most of the 3,100 properties that remain unsold.
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